


Healing and Communication

by InterstellarVagabond



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Platonic or romantic connorth your choice, sexual trauma and anxiety
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-16
Updated: 2019-03-16
Packaged: 2019-11-19 12:11:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18135587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InterstellarVagabond/pseuds/InterstellarVagabond
Summary: Connor tries sex. He doesn't enjoy it. He turns to someone he trusts and admires, and North provides some answers. She's not there to heal him, she's doing healing of her own, but they can heal together.





	Healing and Communication

**Author's Note:**

> This is....a shameless vent fic. Projection and catharsis abound. Hope you can enjoy and heal yourselves.

    It wasn’t that it shouldn’t be a problem, or that he was still programmed to behave as such. It was just that he once had been programmed that way, back when he had no opinions or feelings, and now that the programming had given way to a vague consciousness he was inclined to fall back on the former. It was familiar, but that wasn’t why he did it. It was just all he knew.

    All Connor knew how to do was what he was told. Even when he refused an order or got mouthy, it was all part of a bigger order from someone above Hank’s paygrade.

    He didn’t say no.

She’d been making eyes at Connor all night, ever since he’d entered the bar. He was trying to get out, to live a little, as Hank had told him to. Everyone seemed worried Connor wasn’t living enough, was fading away in the silence of his room working or gaming or sitting idle. So he went out when he could, and he didn’t mind the adventure. Still, there was hardly anything for an android to do in a bar.

Hardly anything.

Hank had explained to him with much grimacing and joking about romance, and Connor was programmed with knowledge of most things sex included. He knew the basics, and Hank explained the more flowery aspects.

_“Look I dunno what to tell you,” Hank groaned. “Sometimes it’s those creeps from the Eden Club looking to get their rocks off, sometimes it’s someone kissing you and just feeling kinda… magical, I dunno. Can we talk about the game again now please?”_

Connor let her drag him out the backdoor, where the rain had let up and left the alley shining with a fine layer of water droplets.

    She pressed her mouth into his, and it didn’t feel magical.

Connor thought, privately and quietly, that her mouth tasted foul like cigarettes and bar peanuts. He let her run her tongue over his and analyzed the sample he received. He held the results in his mind as she left a trail of kisses down his neck that made him shiver.

  **Tobacco**

**Water**

**Glycerol**

**High Fructose Corn Syrup**

**Propylene Glycol**

“What do you want me to do?” she asked, hands on Connor’s chest. She had him all but pressed against the brick wall, but looked up at him with questioning submissive eyes.

It took Connor a moment to realize she was asking him, and longer still to think of an answer.

    “I… don’t know,” he said.

“Baby, I just wanna do whatever you want,” she said with a soft chuckle, kissing Connor again. Connor started straight ahead as she happily closed her eyes. “I just wanna make you feel good.”

“Then do that,” Connor said, sounding more confident than he felt.

She seemed to like it though, grinning brightly and falling softly to her knees. She took one of Connor’s hands, pressing a kiss into the palm.

**Cellulose Fiber**

**Cocoa**

**Licorice**

**Diammonium Phosphate**

**Ammonium Hydroxide**

    Connor felt her unbuttoning his pants with a sort of detached awareness. He realized suddenly that he was too still, hadn’t been moving except for the bare minimum of kissing back. He had to do something, that’s how it worked.

    He reached out, running a hand through her hair and feeling something curl in what he had that passed for a stomach when they leaned into the hand with a happy sigh. She took one of his fingers into her mouth, sucking on it in a way intended to be erotic. She took a break from kneeling to stand and kiss him again, and Connor instructed his body on how to move.

    He instructed his body to embrace her, kiss her hard ignoring the foul taste and running a hand down her back. He pulled from available data all the ways he was supposed to behave until he found himself out of applicable actions.

    She was breathless, hair ruffled, when they seperated. Her eyes were glassy and staring straight at Connor.

    “You’re so beautiful,” she purred, and Connor didn’t log the compliment. He let her slide one hand to the back of his neck, searching with expert fingers. She’d been with an android before. While that hand pressed softly against his neck port, guiding it open, the other slid into his pants.

    This is when fingers that had once been expert grew clumsy, probing about softly and then with vigor and then desperation.

    “Does that feel good?” she asked, and Connor didn’t know how to answer. He didn’t want to hurt her feelings, nor did he feel up to lying. He felt nothing but invasive probing, no pleasure came from this clumsy act and he didn’t know if it was her actions or his causing it. Maybe she was doing it right and he wasn’t.

    “Yes,” he lied, letting his eyes slide shut.

    **1.1 mg nicotine**

**3.0 mg menthol**

**Artificial flavorings: see full content (y/n)?**

    He was too still again, he could feel the confusion radiating off his partner when he did not react to any of her efforts. He could feel a ghost of what he was supposed to be feeling, but mostly he just wanted her hands out of his neck, out of his pants, off of him so he could go home and do something that actually interested him and didn’t make him feel so hyper aware that he was in possession of a body.

    He decided if this method did not bring pleasure to either party, he would switch tactics. He swept them up, turning and pressing her back to the wall. He watched her gasp, and let his eyes trail over her form. He found her attractive, he wanted to try this. He didn’t want to tell her he suddenly wasn’t interested, didn’t want to see the sadness and rejection on her face. He was supposed to be having a good time, and he couldn’t tell her he wasn’t. He couldn’t.

    He kissed her hard, copied her move of kissing down the neck taking time to bite and suck the way he’d learned from her. She shivered in delight as he pushed a hand up her shirt to cup one breast.

    _“I was sick of closing my eyes and doing it for Cyberlife,” North huffed, throwing a dart with vicious intent. Connor watched her from his seat, as she went to retrieve her darts from the dartboard. North was beautiful and furious, and Connor felt safe around her. He had much to learn from her, he thought. “Sick of being their plaything. It hurt, Connor. Everyday of my life it hurt. I’m never feeling that way again.”_

    This didn’t hurt… so it couldn’t be the same. Right? They had both consented, and she was enjoying the sensation of Connor’s fingers in her hair, against her chest, down her stomach, to unbutton her pants.

    He held her in place as he thrust, and she seemed to delight in being used for what he needed to to. He was still proving himself in a way, even as his biocomponents lit up with a program Cyberlife had been kind enough to give their androids. They could have left it at simulated pleasure, faces learned from recognition programs and sounds recorded to delight, but as it turned out plenty of humans could tell when an android was faking. So, they’d given their androids the ability to feel pleasure.

    Sex sells.

    Connor knew he was whimpering, and his partner kissed away each noise like they sustained her. He heard her prompting him to be louder, but he clenched his teeth tight as he sought out a further darker place in his mind and in her body. Yes, this could work. This felt good, he wanted this.

    Then he shuddered and it all stopped. Not because he was finished, but because he suddenly could go no further. The pleasurable sensation was gone, evaporated slowly like the rain in the alleyway. He’d kept thrusting desperately after it, a move his partner mistook for enthusiasm. She came soon after he realized he would not be. He simulated the proper reaction as best he could, and she was to dizzy with orgasm to notice.

    “Was I good?” she asked, trailing a hand down his face.

    “Yes,” he lied.

 

 

    “You’re home late,” Hank commented, as Connor threw his coat onto the hook and let the door slam behind him. Connor grunted a reply, a hand running through his chaotic hair. Hank raised an eyebrow at the uncharacteristically gruff response and sloppy appearance, but he didn’t say anything else.

    Connor headed straight for the shower, discarding clothes and refusing to look even in the direction of the mirror. He couldn’t stand the sight of himself right now, the only thing he could stand was the grounding sensation of fingernails dragging hard down synthetic skin.

    He was an android. He didn’t feel this way. He didn’t say no.

    He was a deviant. He could feel. He could make his own choices.

Two truths battled in his head, and he didn’t really feel like having that fight with himself when there was another issue weighing on his head. Obedient android, free deviant, what did it matter when he would never change? Never really make decisions for himself? What did that even matter when he was like this? Broken. A slut without pleasure, who had sex in the alley behind a bar where anyone could walk by, and didn’t even have the good sense to enjoy it.

He washed the stink of human from his skin, scrubbing too hard on purpose to make the blue rise underneath the pale of his skin until he was tinged blue all over. He did so while staring at the wall, unable to look at himself.

He showered quickly and then pulled on baggy sweatpants and a loose hoodie. He collapsed into his bed feeling an exhaustion that should only come from a faulty battery. Maybe it was malfunctioning? Maybe that’s why he’d been unable to enjoy himself, a malfunction of some sort. They could piece him back together, wipe the irrelevant parts of his memory, send him back out prepared to try again. Just like before.

He could have experimented by himself, run a diagnostic through the process to find whatever part was broken, but he hated the idea. He just wanted to pull his consciousness from this body and stick it in a hard drive somewhere. He wanted to never remember this body again.

    …

    ..

    .

    Connor groaned as his eyes opened in the darkness. His internal clock read 2:34 a.m. which was far earlier than he intended to wake. He’d charged only a few hours, so why was he awake against recommended battery levels?

    He sat up in bed, drawing his legs close to his stomach and feeling relieved when it did not sicken him to wrap his arms around them and keep himself held tight there. He sat in silence for a moment, before he realized what he needed.

 

    Connor couldn’t tell if North had been awake or not when she got his message. She always looked a mixture of put together and ruffled, like she’d planned her outfit with a fight in mind. She let him in, and he spent a moment gazing about her apartment at the various objects that were North’s life. A punching bag hanging from the ceiling, a well cared for but honestly hard to kill plant sitting on the windowsill, a comfortable secondhand couch in front of a big t.v. for inviting Hank over to watch the game or Connor and Markus to watch old movies, no kitchen because she didn’t do human handouts and if Hank wanted snacks or beer he had to bring his own.

    North took a seat on the couch, crossing her legs and waiting expectantly. She didn’t pry but neither did she look uninterested. She just waited until Connor took an unnecessary breath and began to explain the situation.

    He told her the whole story, standing there in his long dark peacoat still wet from the rain that had started up again by the time he left. His hair was dripping a little too, and he felt like he should ask for a towel before he dripped all over her floor and caused some sort of water damage, but the words were spilling out of his mouth faster than the rain could drip from his body and North was listening silently with watchful eyes.

    When Connor stopped talking she stood up, and she looked at him.

“Touch still feel bad?” she asked.

    “No…” he said.

    “Then is it okay if I hug you?” she asked. “Don’t bullshit me.”   

    Connor nodded, and North drew him into her arms. She didn’t stroke his hair or otherwise make her hands busy all over his body, she just held him and held him tight because she knew about the weighted blanket folded neatly on Connor’s bed and the way he delighted in letting Sumo tackle him and hold him against the ground.

    “You weren’t ready,” she said softly, pulling away but keeping her hands on his arms to squeeze tight. “Your body might have been, but you weren’t and that just happens sometimes. It’s okay.”   

    “I’m an adult, I’m experienced in so many parts of life,” Connor said almost bitterly. “How can I not be ready yet?”

    “Who knows,” North said. “No one decides these things. Some of us take longer, some of us are never ready.”

    Connor sighed, and pinched the bridge of his nose. “I’ve always heard sex was supposed to be healing. That sexual anxiety got in the way of some greater unity between two or more people where a simple reaction can… can make you feel better, can let you indulge in something simple and happy.”

    “It’s never simple, Connor,” North said. “Look, I’m happy for those people out there that can be sexually liberated and call it simple and be happy. I am. But it’s not like that for everyone. For some of us sex is stopping a lot, saying it doesn’t feel good or feel like anything. It’s asking ‘are you okay?’ instead of ‘does this feel good?’ and talking lots of talking and stopping and just taking a breather or never coming back to it at all.”

    “I don’t want it to be like that for me though,” Connor said, voice frustrated.

    “I’m sorry, Con, but you can’t decide that,” North said, all tough love. “All you can decide is your actions, and when you pick your boundaries.”

    “It’s… too hard making boundaries,” Connor said.

    “I know,” North said.

    “I… shouldn’t do this,” Connor said. “You’re not here to heal me, you have troubles of your own and your expertise and kindness do not make you my caretaker.”   

    “Did I say I was caretaking you?” North asked, arching an eyebrow. “I’m not going to fix you Connor, that’s not my job. I’m your friend, and I think you should stay here because it’s late and you’re upset. That’s all.”

    Connor nodded, feeling like she was far too good for him. North seemed to sense his thoughts, because she hugged him again and then gestured for him to wait while she went to get a towel.

    When she came back and he reached for the towel, she pulled it out of his grasp and tossed it onto his head. She dried off his hair, laughing at the face he made with a wrinkled nose and confused eyes. Then she pulled off his dripping coat and tossed it carelessly over the couch, not seeming to mind the damp that would seep into the fabric.

    Connor felt alone when she pulled away, which confused him. Not even two hours ago he was causing himself pain because of someone else’s touch. Now he wished North would come back and touch his hair again, smooth it back down into place.

    “Why does physical intimacy feel good sometimes, and not others?” he asked and North shrugged.

    “I told you, it’s just like that,” she said.

    “So, when the girl from the bar touched my hair it felt bad… and when you did it it felt good… and there’s no reason for it?” he asked.

    “Well you know me better than you knew her,” North said, giving Connor a look that told him this should be obvious. “Plus, I don’t plan on sleeping with you. It feels good sometimes, to just be close to someone knowing they don’t want anything else from you. You know?”

    “Oh…” Connor said.

    “I like it too sometimes,” North continued. “Markus and I… we never really picked up where we left off. But sometimes I ask him to hold me, just the way we are without any other expectations or desires. I know he doesn’t want anything from me that I don’t want to give him, and I know at any point I can tell him to get lost and he’ll kick his ass out.”

    Connor snorted, almost halfway to a laugh. North looked at him awhile, before walking up and offering her hand. Connor slowly reached out and took it. She squeezed it tight, not interfacing, just holding it.

    “If you rush into things, romance or sex, it can be too much,” she said. “Sometimes it’s better to just take it slow, not have any expectations, and enjoy what is not what could be. What could be is fine, but it’s in the future. Right now I’m holding your hand, and maybe in the future I’ll let you interface with me, or kiss me, or maybe I’ll tell you to get lost and you’ll kick your ass out. Doesn’t matter, right now I’m holding your hand.”

    Connor nodded, squeezing her hand back.

“Now come on,” North said. “It’s late. I don’t like to kill my battery like you do.”

    She led him to the bedroom, and since he’d only thrown a coat over his pajamas he had no need to change. She pulled back the blanket and looked at Connor, a silent question.

Bed, couch, or standing in the corner?

He chose the bed, and laid down and felt comforted when her weight joined his in the bed. She turned the lights off and they lay there a moment before he spoke again.

“North?”

“Connor.”

“Do you want to be held right now?”

North turned over to face him, a small smile on her lips. Then she turned back around, curling to fit the curve of his body as he put an arm around her. She guided his hand to rest over hers, fingers intertwining but not interfacing, not yet. Neither of them had decided on that yet, and they didn’t want to that night. All they wanted to do that night was go to sleep feeling safe in someone’s arms.

So they did.

   

   


End file.
